A British keyboard player born in 1949, known for his banks of keyboards with Yes and for his solo concept albums, Rick Wakeman is among the first clients of Mountain Studios. He recorded “Rick Wakeman’s Criminal Record” there in 1977, the year Yes were cutting “Going for the One” in the same studio. He also took the festival stage three times, always at the Casino de Montreux: on 8 July 1977, on 19 July 1979 with his band, and on 20 July 1980.
Rick Wakeman: spring 1977, between studio and churches
Two albums in six months, in the same place
1977 was the year Rick Wakeman never left Montreux. He had just rejoined Yes, who finished “Going for the One” at Mountain Studios in April. Without pausing, he carried straight on in the same studio, between April and June, with his fifth solo album, “Rick Wakeman’s Criminal Record”.
He produced it himself. On engineering, John Timperley was assisted by a twenty-one-year-old who would become the studio’s central figure and Queen’s regular producer: Dave Richards.
Two Yes bandmates came to lend a hand, Chris Squire on bass and Alan White on drums. The record, almost entirely instrumental, is built around crime and justice, in the vein of “The Six Wives of Henry VIII”. It was released in November 1977 on A&M.
An organ in Vevey, a choir in Montreux
Wakeman was never satisfied with the studio keyboards alone. For “Criminal Record” he needed a pipe organ and a choir, and neither fits in a booth.
The organ was therefore recorded at the Temple Saint-Martin de Vevey, the very one where he had just cut the organ part of “Awaken” for Yes. The choir was taped at the Temple Saint-Vincent, the church of the Les Planches district in the old town of Montreux, the record credits simply call it “Église de Planches”.
Within a few months, an English keyboard player had thus put to work a casino studio, a Vevey church and a Montreux church, for two different records. Few artists have used the geography of the Riviera so methodically.
The only natural island in Lake Geneva, a few dozen square metres and a plane tree: it appears inside the sleeve of “Going for the One”, the album Yes were recording in Montreux.
Music recorded in Montreux
1977
Rick Wakeman's Criminal Record
In the wake of “Going for the One”, the Yes keyboardist stayed on in Montreux for his solo album, recorded at Mountain Studios with Chris Squire and Alan White.
